The invention relates to a method of evaluating and copying a strip of originals, of the type wherein, prior to the copying, the originals are evaluated with respect to density, color, copiability, or the like, with information derived from such evaluations being entered upon an information carrier. The invention also relates to an apparatus for performing this type of method.
In general, with this type of method, the negatives to be copied are evaluated with respect to their density and color deviations by automatic means, and are evaluated by a human operator with respect to copiability or printability. The human operator is furthermore in a position to perform a check over the automatically determined density and/or correction values. With simpler apparatus of the type in question, the human operator performs all the evaluations himself. The resulting exposure-correction values or determinations that certain originals are not copiable, for example because too unclear or not even exposed, are then usually fed into a storage device by means of a keyboard at the evaluating station. After the evaluation has been completed, the typed in evaluation information is transmitted to a suitable information carrier, for example a perforatable strip, a magnetic tape, or the like. This information carrier is thereupon processed in synchronism with the strip of originals in the copying station, in such a manner that the exposure-control means at the copying station can be made to process each original in correspondence to the information associated therewith on the information carrier. The requisite synchronization between the information carrier and the strip of originals can be achieved only by very expensive and complicated control arrangements. If such a control arrangement malfunctions, so that information regarding a particular negative is not properly entered on the information carrier, it may happen that the correlation between such information and the corresponding ones of the originals will be lost, i.e., a shift may develop as between the originals and the information associated with them. When this happens, several hundred negatives may become improperly or unnecessarily exposed.